Shostakovich
David Nice
Laid-back Tenerife and Gran Canaria won't know what's hit them when the London Philharmonic Orchestra and its principal conductor Vladimir Jurowski land next week. The islands can expect to be sense-bombed by the jungly exuberance of Szymanowski and devastated by the scorched-earth tactics of Shostakovich at his most extreme. Even Londoners used to the highly sophisticated assaults of the city's most challenging orchestral partnership, and faced with the same programme last night, may have been taken aback by the keenly directed electricity of the occasion.Jurowski certainly Read more ...
David Nice
They're still bringing Beethoven and Shostakovich to London, enriching the mix a little with the cross-referencing of Alfred Schnittke, but the personnel of the Borodin Quartet have changed again. Patriarch cellist Valentin Berlinsky, there at the start over 60 years ago, passed on his bow to Vladimir Balshin before he died. Balshin is a worthy successor, especially since Berlinsky's tone had become translucent to the point of dematerialising and his successor's is rich indeed, but is "Borodin Quartet" now more a brand name than a vital entity?Well, continuity Read more ...
edward.seckerson
The charismatic St Petersburg-born Vasily Petrenko has really been turning things around at the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra since he took over as Principal Conductor in 2005. With both standards and audiences on the up he has embarked upon his first major recording project – to record all 15 Shostakovich Symphonies for the Naxos label.Two releases are now available and in this exclusive podcast he talks to Edward Seckerson about the project in general and the symphonies in particular. The 11th “The Year 1905” makes extensive use of revolutionary songs and graphically portrays the Read more ...
theartsdesk
This month's round-up of the latest classical CDs takes in a major new Schubert recording by Mark Padmore and Paul Lewis, a pair of Shostakovich symphonies brought to fresh life in Liverpool under a young Russian conductor from the composer's home-town, a Mahler symphony recorded by the German orchestra that premiered it, a Kipling-inspired satire on artistic epigones by the half-forgotten Charles Koechlin, rare Rossini arias from Joyce DiDonato, a 60th-anniversary box-set from the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and more.CD of the Month
Schubert: Winterreise, Mark Padmore/Paul Lewis ( Read more ...